There was something to be said for inadvertent survival. That was how Maxim felt right now - inadvertent.

He hadn't seen anyone for what must have been three days. He was with Benjamin, the good Benjamin, they were traveling together, when suddenly there was a calvacade of shouting on the slopes they had passed by. There was a girl Maxim recognized on sight as Kimiko, a girl who was now a dangerous marauding murderer, and Maxim did the sensible thing, the thing that should have made sense and did so very much at the time, and ran back to where they came. He didn't stop, no matter how much his chest heaved and his unused muscles burned, but eventually Maxim returned to the place from whence they came and suddenly he was alone. Benjamin was gone.

And he had all that time to think. Just think about what Cristo's death actually meant in the grand scheme of things, what all the other deaths meant as well. They of course meant that people he once shared hallways and classes and altercations with no longer existed, but it also meant, for every name on that announcement, there was one less monster going for his head.

As long as Maxim told himself that, everything would be fine.

So that was why he hid. That was why he stayed in the Dormitories until the voices stopped, then changed to another location, until that location was consumed by voices. He was alone with his thoughts, which is how he liked it. With all the external factors removed from the equation of Maxim, the margin of error reached near zero. But there became a point when his thoughts stopped becoming helpful and started becoming intrusive.

First he was rounding his own thoughts. Nothing new was coming. No plans, no entry point, nothing. Maxim didn't know why - he was smart, wasn't he? Why wasn't his mind racing with the possibilities? Why wasn't he coming up with a perfectly new prospect each hour, like he managed to do when he was with Ben or Lilli or Ben or the two girls from the very first day? If he could think them amongst the droning whimpering idiots who still remained alive, why was his mind now destroying itself trying to come up with anything, just anything?

Worse yet, he was constantly thinking about Cristo. About how even though had obviously done something wrong, done something to warrant his death at the hands of a long aforementioned marauding murderer, and it was his own blöd fault he was dead, that they were never going to speak again. For every situation he encountered and wondered "what would Cristo do here?", there would be no answer because the world would never know because Cristo was dead and the marauding murderer got a weapon for it.

The sun was setting on Day 4 when those thoughts entered Maxim's mind, and without warning his vomited the contents of his stomach onto the front of his clothes.

Even though he was alone, a knot twisted in his stomach as he sat there in the ward, covered in his own bile and puke. The knot was not from the pain that had influenced the reaction in the first place, it was from the shame. He looked disgusting. He looked like a disgusting little brat who had yet to reach Kindergarten. He looked like he belonged among the dead already, not like he deserved.

He didn't change from his clothes. He just sat and waited for the sogginess to turn to crust and the smell to cease invading his nostrils and he could do nothing more from that point but fall asleep.

*

When Maxim awoke, hidden behind the overturned bed, he saw it was light. He hadn't missed an announcement. The light did not match the previous days and their own announcements, which was all the consistency he had remaining in his mind. He collected his belongings, including the meager rations of food he had left and the disgusting bow with its similarly disgusting arrows, and moved on.

The more he walked, the wards turned into corridors, administration. There were no longer beds, but offices. He was where the doctors stayed, not the patients.

The stench was unbearable. Everywhere Maxim moved, he could barely escape it. Eventually, he found a path away, forcing himself into a dead-end office with a single examination bed. The smell remained, but it was distant. Lingering, but distant.

Maxim sat upon the bed, bag curled into his chest. He looked at his feet. They were sore, tired, wishing there would be less to do, less miles to walk before they could sleep. It was ironic, Maxim once enjoyed walking, now it pained him. It was something he no longer enjoyed.

As he sat looking at his feet, he heard a loud voice echo throughout the halls. It was questioning. It was in despair. Maxim wanted to avoid it, not go near it.